November 4, 2022
Women today are the ultimate boss babes. We are studying, working hard, building businesses, raising families and crushing goals. So making sure we have the most effective and efficient work out is paramount. That being said, how do you know if your current training split or gym routine is the right one for you?
Women today are the ultimate boss babes. We are studying, working hard, building businesses, raising families and crushing goals. So making sure we have the most effective and efficient work out is paramount. That being said, how do you know if your current training split or gym routine is the right one for you?
As much as I’m sure we would all love to be training 5-6 times a week this just isn’t always a reality, sometimes life does just happen. We have meetings, holidays, vacations, birthdays, etc that just don’t allow us to spend an hour a day at the gym. Yes we can cancel or rearrange plans when we are working towards a certain goal, but we want this to be a lifestyle change, so you need to make sure that your workouts fit into your life, not the other way round.
I want to go through some insights and questions to help you build the perfect routine, so you can be a boss babe and still smash your fitness goals.
Start my assessing your current schedule, without including your workouts. Take note of days you are working, days you are studying, how long you need to meal prep, family time, everything down to how long you need to wash your hair. Everything you do should be noted, this way you can assess what is a priority, and what can be negotiated, like that 2 hours of Netflix in the evening. Don’t get me wrong, it is important to have downtime, to relax, watch a movie, take a bath, read, whatever it is you like to do for your self care. Just don’t forget that exercise is a form of self care too and is important if you want to have a healthy lifestyle. Once this is done it should give you a good indication of what days you actually have available to fit in a workout.
The next thing you want to look at is your rest. Rest is such an important part of not only your training, but your overall health. You need time for your body to repair the body tissue from your training sessions, and remember that you can only train as hard as you recover. You will find that if you allow your body the time it needs to recover properly, you will have a much better workout on your next session. This is why most athletes split their workouts into separate body parts, so that each part has sufficient time to recover before training them again.
Ensuring you have enough time to recover can also help you to prevent injury. If your muscles are still fatigued, or if you yourself are fatigued, you are more likely to have poor form when performing movements.
Signs of fatigue can include:
- Sore or aching muscles
- Irritability or moodiness
- Inability to concentrate
- Not being able to sleep
- Feeling unmotivated
- Still feeling tired after rest
If you don’t like the idea of being completely inactive during rest days you may like to try some LISS cardio, like a steady walking outside or even try some of the stretches from the EvolveYou app. Classes like gentle yoga can be great too, stretching is a third of fitness so make sure you allow time to stretch your muscles, you will see an improvement in your overall performance too.
Another factor you want to consider is your nutrition. Are you allowing yourself enough time to have healthy nutritious meals? I can meal prep 3 days of lunches in around 20 minutes, so I always make sure on a Sunday I allow myself time to get them prepared. If I haven’t prepared healthy lunches I know I will end up at the store buying foods that aren’t particularly healthy, or even worse I’ll spend the whole day snacking on biscuits. It genuinely does not take sense to workout for 2 hours a day but leave yourself no time to cook or to eat healthy foods. Remember this is about creating a healthy lifestyle, so a balanced diet and keeping yourself hydrated is all apart of that.
Ok so now it’s time to determine exactly what your fitness goals are and the (realistic) time frame in which you would like to achieve them. I do not believe in any type of quick fix or crash diet. So the more time you can give yourself to achieve your goals in the healthiest way the better. So if your goal is weight loss and you want to lose 10 pounds, I might set myself a 4 month target. Remember no two bodies are the same so what will take me 4 months, will take someone else 2 months, and another 6 months, all perfectly ok. So know what is realistic for you and set your target. Keeping your goals in mind, you should now have a much clearer of how much training and nutritional prep you will need to implement to succeed.
Now there are many different types of workout splits, here are the most commonly used splits:
1) Body part splits: Glutes & Hamstrings, Quads & Calves, Back & Biceps, Chest & Triceps (or similar).
2) Push/Pull split: This involves dividing your workouts into pulling and pushing movements and legs.
3) Upper body/Lower body split: Rather than splitting by body part you simply split into full upper body, and full lower body days.
4) Full body training: Usually for those short on time/days. Full body workouts with rest days after every session.
Fortunately the EvolveYou app has done the hard work for you. The workout splits are already in place so you just need to decide if you prefer to train 3 days per week or 5 days per week. If like me you find yourself around the 4 days a week mark then why not try the 3 days per week plan and then use one of the challenges or full body workouts for the extra day, the booty burner and full body dumbbell are my personal favorites.
If you struggle to find time to get to the gym during the week, how about trying the home guide 3 days a week and heading to the gym to try a gym based challenge at the weekend? The app offers a weekly planner so it is super easy for you to plan your workouts in advance so you are never left unsure on the day of what you need to do, and if life happens, you can simply adjust the planner and it will move the workouts forward to suit your schedule.
The most important thing for you to remember is that just because someone else has a certain fitness routine or lifestyle, does not mean that you have to replicate that in order to achieve your goals. Everybody leads a completely different life, so instead of focusing on what anyone else is doing, focus on what will work best for you, you are doing this for you after all.
Let us know what workout split you have chosen and this works best for you. Don’t forget to tag us in @toneandsculptapp #toneandsculptapp
